Why Don’t YOU Try Surviving on Saltwater

How marine creatures defy dehydration and a lesson from flying closer to the Sun than we should

With weariness weighing down his wings, Icarus, son of the master craftsman Daedalus, felt the sun’s relentless heat intensify as he dared to ascend higher and higher. The wax binding his feathers had started to soften under the increasing heat, but the boundless sky was blinding and intoxicating.

Incarcerated on the island of Crete for defying the mighty King Minos, Daedalus, ever the inventor, devised a daring plan of escape. He constructed wings of feathers and wax for himself and his young son. Icarus, aglow with youthful impetuosity and the thrilling prospect of flight, ignored his father’s stern warning not to fly too close to the sun.

Despite the odds, he summoned a final surge of determination, striving for the heavens. Fate — and omnipotence — had other plans. The feathers finally loosened, and gravity, with its unforgiving grip, pulled him back down. The shimmering expanse of the sea was the unforgiving emergency landing area.

Desperate gasps filled the air as he tasted the harsh brine, his parched throat in agony against the most vicious irony. Water, water everywhere, yet not a drop to drink. His lips cracked, his mind tormented, and every cell in his body shrieked for relief. And in the cruelest (and most absurd) of paradoxes, Icarus, the boy who dared to fly too closer to the Sun than he should have, died of thirst surrounded by 97% of the Earth’s water.

This paradox mirrors the challenge faced by the countless creatures beneath the ocean’s shimmering surface. Surrounded by water laden with salt, they must sustain the delicate balance of maintaining hydration without succumbing to a mortal intake of salt. Through evolution, they have developed ingenious mechanisms to survive in this seemingly inhospitable environment.

And their survival strategies are nothing short of marine marvels.

A Salty Truth

We humans carry around 250 grams of salt in our bodies, helping nerves fire and muscles contract. Lose too much, and you’re in trouble. Animals that feast on meat can replenish their salt stash from their…